** Warning ** This is whiny and has TMI at times. Read at your own risk! ;)

Tuesday, August 5th. The day had finally arrived for baby boy #3 to be born. Stephen and I took some photos of our family of four before we became a family of five. It is strange waiting around all day waiting for a c-section. Why could they have not scheduled it for the morning?

We arrived at the hospital at 3:35pm for my 5:30pm c-section. They prep'd me for surgery and about 5:00pm the anesthesiologist came in. A few minutes later my OB dropped in and we chatted about the surgery and the baby. At 5:35pm they wrapped me in a warm blanket and I walked across the hall into the operating room. I laid down on the table and started getting really scared. This was my third c-section but that did not make it any easier or more reassuring. I was very frightened. I was also upset that my yet to be born son did not have a name! We had just spent the last 1.5 hours narrowing our list of 10+ names down to four and then finally to two as we left for the operating room (Cameron and Carson).

The spinal was inserted about 5:40 and by 5:55 they started the operation. Things progressed quickly and my baby was born at 6:00pm on the dot! He came out peeing! I took a quick peek at him and saw a mass of black hair! Stephen announced that he looked like a Carson - he finally had a name! Stephen went across the room with Carson while they cleaned him up. I started getting really, really hot and told the anesthesiologist that I was hot and I felt pains in my chest. He reassured me that my ekg was fine but there was a lot of discussion with the staff in the operating room. All I could think about was how hot I was. I couldn't even concentrate on the baby. About 35 minutes later we were all moved back to my room for recovery. Stephen and I had decided not to call anyone to tell them the news until the baby had a full name. I loved the name Carson but was so uncomfortable that I didn't really want to discuss a middle name. Finally I told Stephen that if he really loved the name Ezra so much would could call the baby Carson Ezra. We made our first phone call announcing Carson Ezra's birth about 90 minutes after he was born. I do love his name.

I threw up several times from the spinal. I remember cuddling Carson at one point then yelling "I'm going to barf!". I felt like a horrible mom and I was not a good patient.

I finally started feeling better the next afternoon. I was no longer hot. My IV and catheter was removed around dinner time. I started to get some really terrible pains about an hour later and after an unsuccessful trip to the bathroom to urinate, I nearly fainted on the floor. Stephen and the nurse caught me. I kept telling them my bladder was too full to pee but they assured me that could not be the case. Finally I was given a special bladder ultrasound and my bladder had nearly a litre of urine in it. I had to have the catheter reinserted (NO FUN!). Within minutes the pain was gone. They think the other catheter had been pressing against the wall of my bladder so it could not empty properly.

The rest of our stay was uneventful. Carson was latching on wonderfully and I was able to get about 1.5 hours of sleep at a time during the night! Friday morning we left the hospital to go home to our new life as a family of five

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Happy 1st Birthday to my baby.